Tinman has given me a gentle ribbing for using "office" as a verb, when I said, "I office on the 13th floor." The usage sounds fine to my ear, but on checking the dictionary I see that Tinman is right: "office" is not listed as a verb (except in a different, obsolete sense).¹

Is there a name for such a use of a noun as if it were a verb? Perhaps "verbification" or "to verbify"?

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¹However, you can find on-line instances of that verb-usage, as in §1320A of the Oklahoma statutes regard bail bondsmen: "he shall provide the court clerk with proof that he is a resident of said county or that he offices in said county."

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Is there a name for such a use of a noun as if it were a verb?

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Ummmm....(ducking) Wrong? (really ducking!)

Second question: What prompts verbifying?

In this particular case, unless you verbify you are forced to use either the passive voice ("My office is on … ") or a weak verb ("I have my office on …"). I By verbifying you can speak with an active verb ("I office on …"). Might this be the typical prod that leads to verbifying?

Interestingly, if one were locating a home or a retail sales outlet, rather than an office, it would be perfectly permissible name it with a verb ("I sell from …" or "I reside at …").

Might you not say that you officiate on the 13th floor?

Calvin, (of Calvin and Hobbes): "I like to verb words."

Hobbes: "What?"

Calvin: ""I take nouns and adjectives and use them as verbs. Remember when 'access' was a thing? Now it's something to do. It got verbed. Verbing weirds language".

Hobbes: "Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding."

http://www.henriettahay.com/language/00jul14.htm

http://www.henriettahay.com/language.htm

http://swankivy.envy.nu/verbing.html

The entries on this last site are facetious.

Tinman

How about "I work on the 13th floor"?

The verbing of America
Is getting out of hand,
Yet many nouns are also verbs,
Like toast and rake and land.
When I first heard hospitalize,
I thought it was a crime;
Why don't we apartmentalize?
We will -- just give us time!
If when we change a noun to verb
To come up with our `verbing,'
Why can't I, when I'm using herbs,
Refer to it as herbing?
For if I call myself a cook
, The verbal form is cooking;
And if I give someone a look,
It's also known as looking.
I give a gift
But I'm not gifting.
You get my drift,
Or am I drifting?
I get a bill
Because of billing,
But taking pills
Is never pilling.
I place a pin,
And I am pinning.
Play a violin --
Is it violining?
But play a fiddle,
And you're fiddling;
Or is this getting
Much too piddling?
Planting some seeds
Is always seeding,
And pulling weeds
Is surely weeding;
If drawing blood
Is always bleeding,
Why does a flood
Not lead to fleeding?
I'm wined and dined
But never beered.
I've eyed someone,
But never eared!
Turn on a light,
And I am lighting.
Turn on a lamp,
And it's not lamping.
If I can verbalize
A needle,
And egging on
Can mean to wheedle,
And I am doodling
With a doodle,
When I cook pasta,
Can't I noodle?
With all these punctuation marks,
I'm doing quite a lot of dotting;
But if I were to use a dash --
Don't you agree that I am dashing?
But comma-ing and period-ing?
And yet I can italicize
And sometimes must capitalize.
I Anglicize -- but Germanicize?
Or Swedicize, or Gaelicize?
With this I could go on and on,
Really ad infinitum;
Whether I lick these word problems,
I sure cannot beat 'em.
Our language is an enigma
In how its words are used;
And that is why, in verbing nouns,
We ought to be excused.

Thanks to Jessica Kestner, who found this in St. Paul Pioneer Press

Thank you for my laugh of the day, Arnie. (Big Kiss)

I have already made this point elswhere - in English there are no nouns that cannot be verbed!

Richard English

Changing the subject a bit. Annie quotes,

With this I could go on and on, / Really ad infinitum;
Whether I lick these word problems, / I sure cannot beat 'em.

Obviously, arnie, you pronounce the penultimate syllable of "infinitum" as a long e. I pronounce it as a long i. I wondered if this could be another Britspeak-vs-USspeak difference, but then came across a british poem with the long-i pronunciation.

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So, naturalists observe, a flea
Has smaller fleas that on him prey;
And these have smaller still to bite ’em;
And so proceed ad infinitum.
-- Jonathan Swift

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Can anyone elucidate the difference?

Long "i" or long "e" sound?

I think this has something to do with The Great Vowel Shift (http://www.furman.edu/~mmenzer/gvs/index.htm). I can't understand it well enough to try to explain it. Perhaps Bob or Richard do.

Tinman

I was talking with a friend of mine today. I said I had to add something to my list of things to do today. She said, "you are always listing!" I wanted to ask her, "to the port or starboard side?" It was another of those strange uses of a noun for a verb. Or am I hearing it wrong?

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¹However, you can find on-line instances of that verb-usage, as in §1320A of the Oklahoma statutes regard bail bondsmen: "he shall provide the court clerk with proof that he is a resident of said county or that he offices in said county."

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Somehow I just knew that Shufitz would redeem himself!
Just wondering, Shufitz, how long did it take you to find that example? The Oklahoma statutes???

Swift's poem certainly indicates that the word was pronounced "in-fin-eye-tum", but if I were parsing it in school I'd say "in-fin-it-um". The poem I posted comes from your side of the pond, St Paul, so it's not a Brit-USA thing. My guess is "poetic licence".

This is an old thread to revive!

We've talked about verbifying words here, including in this thread. I had not heard moot used as a verb before, have you? The sentence I read was about attorneys "mooting" before each other to practice for court. But then I found some other interesting uses of it, like "Egypt has been mooting a high-speed rail project to link..." or "...confrontation that has stoked fear of a new Middle East war, with Israel mooting last-resort air strikes...." I bet you like those, arnie!

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"Egypt has been mooting a high-speed rail project to link..."

That's fine by me.

I thought Mu Ting was a Chinese guy of little significance.

The "raise a point" meaning has been a verb for quite a while.

1685 tr. B. Gracián y Morales Courtiers Oracle 253 Politicians now a-days moot nothing else, but that the greatest Wisedom consists in making it appear.

Oh, that's a nice one to add to the piggy bank-- I gather 'mooting' is what I would call 'floating an idea'?

I've even heard (mostly during newscasts)that "So--and-so is mooted to be doing such-and-such...' so it's not an unknown usage.

It's obviously a hot thing if there are so many ways to refer to it: verbing (Calvin & Hobbes), verbifying (this thread), and denominal verbs (the term used by grammarians). Verbing is probably the best one because verb itself is a noun that has been verbed.

I, personally, like office as a verb.

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I, personally, like office as a verb.

Ah, yes - the original topic of this thread way back in 2002.

[Edited typo]

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kalleh,

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Verbing is probably the best one because verb itself is a noun that has been verbed.

I prefer "verbing" myself. It's also more succinct. "Verbifying" seems rather too florid a word for me. Similarly, I prefer "burgle" to "burglarise". Also I like Calvin and Hobbes.

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Originally posted by arnie:
Also I like Calvin and Hobbes.

That shows your very good taste. Only the best comic strip of all time! But I have never understood how Thomas Hobbes and John Calvin reflect the traits of the strip's characters, other than Calvin's sometimes being fanatical in his attitude.